Combo Cooker

breadstick 2026-04-21 03:53

A very novel fusion of deckbuilding and cooking minigame... it was amusing to have to open up the massive flowchart of foods like some ancient alchemist trying to chart recipes across its various stages. I think there might've been something wrong with the meatloaf recipe--I was feeding in two burgers and though the merge button appeared, it wasn't getting me my Paradise by the Dashboard Lights. Maybe it was because I had some upgraded meats? Not sure...

I also bought that cursed relic and I don't know what it did beyond applying 5 points of psychic damage to my irl brain.

Fun game overall! I'm always a sucker for deckbuilding games

poboy 2026-04-21 03:59

Hmmmm one of these cards are not like the other

I had fun discovering the combinations and feeding raw meat burgers to people, I don't think this restaurant is OSHA compliant

2026-04-21 20:03

I really like the game although not sure about the theme, what's the signal ? I've surely missed it so i'll wait for an answer before rating that,

With that said the game is well fleshed and I enjoyed my playtesting, good job !

arthur-mairs 2026-04-22 12:42

@breadstick Our favorite comment so far! thanks for checking it out, we patched a few gamebreaking bugs, so hopefully it works a bit better, but thanks for checking it out! And the cursed relic is Ricky, he is cursed, and continues to curse us all with his presence. Was inspired by Slay the Spire!

@poboy Hey we got an F from the OSHA, that means 'fine', yeah? Thanks for playing!

@rhookx We took the approach of mostly ignoring the theme, oops, but we reasoned out that it could be people signalling you for food, or you hitting the bell to signal them about the food, but we weren't too attached to it! thanks for playing!

2026-04-22 13:16

Your game is incredibly good! The idea is fresh and the whole game is super enjoyable to play. It’s impressive how well you put this together quickly. If it’s possible, please come and try our game, we really want your fair and honest feedback, thanks!

grummelchen 2026-04-22 13:26

Cool concept, I was a bit overwhelmed by the follow chart in the beginning, but it was really fun mixing different things on the fly. I had some issues with the combine though, it sometimes good stuck and I couldn't combine ingredients anymore

miclefirst 2026-04-22 13:33

I didn’t play many rounds, but I still appreciated the originality of the idea, the humor, the difficulty, and the sheer amount of game content — outstanding work, you can be proud of it

djtequila 2026-04-22 13:36

Nice game! I liked the strategy of deciding which cards to retain and what to buy. The core gameplay loop is a lot of fun. That diagram is a lot to follow though, I would have liked some in-game hints or maybe a recipe book. That said, it's really impressive that you implemented all those foods in 72 hours. Also I may have bought too many potato relics...

n-o-x 2026-04-22 14:39

I really enjoyed playing the game. That’s not always the case when you’re testing Ludum Dare games. So for that alone, well done. I really enjoyed grinding through round after round.

drainkid 2026-04-23 04:31

A cooking deckbuilder is something I never really considered, but it makes a lot of sense - and also plays pretty well! The only thing I'd say is its a bit unclear how to make things sometimes, which I suppose is part of it, but there's fairly simple recipes like the egg in a basket that I could just never figure out. Tried Egg + Bread, Boiled Egg + Bread, Boiled Egg + Toast, Egg + Toast, nada, never knew how to make it, even though I feel like any one of those things could've been it. Also, I went infinite with cursed tokens because AFAIK they never increase in price but keep giving you more gold. I was making like ~$80 off of one toast.

Anyway, really good job, I enjoyed it a lot!

yuriscat 2026-04-23 05:59

This is a game that requires exploration, and I really love that sense of achievement when you slowly figure things out and finally succeed!

hexstart 2026-04-23 21:05

I really like the physical nature of the game, as in - having all of the user interface represented and laid out on the table. It's a good fit for a card game, it felt natural to drag cards to different areas. I didn't fully get the prices in the shop though - energy felt like the main limiter at the start, but it was only $5, whereas additional breads were like $50.

mrtroy 2026-04-26 03:53

"I want burger" and then "I have burger" made me laugh. It took me a bit to get the hang of what I was suppose to do. But I still felt like I wasn't able to ever get the cards that I needed... Because of bread. Oh so much bread.

I managed to get to round 3 twice and can't keep up with demand... too much bread. :sob:

I also had to go in to full screen mode in order to see what I could do. Most of the UI was chopped off. I did enjoy myself while playing though.

roitchie 2026-04-26 05:13

I love card games but I never expected to see one here. The mechanic of combining the cards is fun and all the card mechanics are well fleshed out. Which is very difficult to do in 72 hours. Well done!

zamizmi 2026-04-26 07:32

Interesting approach for Signal, I had a bit of trouble connecting the dots to signal tho.

The idea and breadth of combinations was refreshing, but noticed some challenges (pic related) - recipes were acquirable even if the ingredients were not: Id combine the base ingredients to recipe unlocks so there cant be a situation where you actually cant even in theory complete them - Deck size grows too large => odds of hitting a specific rare card gets too low and therefore reduces players feeling of accomplishemt - Balancing will improve game: focusing solely on burgers + toasts was had really good ROI with the upgrages - Upgrades were _way too cheap_ - Shop UI is "broken" as some of the buyables are not visible: I recommend the check Canvas Scaler + Scroll-feature

Well done!

Screenshot 2026-04-26 at 10.12.18.png

irkar 2026-04-26 11:50

Really cool game i and lovely guide provided which is easy to use and recognize good jobphoto_2026-04-26_14-49-11.jpg

venomousmouse 2026-04-27 12:02

Special thanks for the guide in the description, it was a real lifesaver. xD I like the sounds and the clean visuals. Also a good take on combinations and variations of food. Good job.

2026-04-27 20:46

I’m really impressed with the number of combinations you managed to implement in the time you had. The gameplay feels intuitive and is presented clearly. I also like the retain box as a strategic option to help manage some of the RNG that comes with this type of game.

I did run into some UI issues on web where text was getting clipped, and parts of the shop were impossible to see, even in fullscreen. That made it difficult to navigate and definitely impacted my experience.

I wasn’t entirely sure how it connects to the jam’s signal theme, but I may have just missed that connection.